Stephen Talks with Writer Ta-Nehisi Coates on Race and Mass Incarceration
Coates discusses incarceration, crime and reparations for the black community.
Today in an hour long special, Stephen Henderson talks with author Ta-Nehisi Coates about his new article, “The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration.”
Incarceration: Policies and government have not helped the black community, Coates says. “You have a country that incarcerates 700 people per 100,000…incarcerat[ing] 25 percent of the world’s prisoners.” According to a chart in Coates’ “Mass Incarceration” article, the rate of crime goes up even with increased incarceration.
Reparations: Coates talks about how America can begin to repair the damage done to African Americans through reparations. He sites post-WWII Germany’s reparations to Jews as a government atoning for past injustices. “The Germany that paid reparations is not the same Germany of the Third Reich,” Coates says.
To read Ta-Nehisi Coates’ article “The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration,” click here.
Click the link above to listen to the full conversation.
